


dream launched

by strawberrv



Category: NCT (Band), WAYV
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Idols, M/M, Non AU, basically speculation on the industry n idol life lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-08 18:19:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18628684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strawberrv/pseuds/strawberrv
Summary: he feels it happening, this shift all around him like, like slowly but surely the ground he’s standing on is being pulled away. just a centimeter at a time, so he can’t prove it’s happening, and almost doesn’t notice.but hedoesnotice, is the thing.





	dream launched

**Author's Note:**

> ..... hello LGBTNCT community  
> nsdjcsdjdsdosjn SO im finally dipping my toesies into writing nct fic.. this is mostly about wayv just bc i love them :( and i got turned into a tencas stan by [cdf](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16532141) and THEN i listened to would that i by hozier and had feelings and somehow wrote this in one sitting !
> 
> i want to make it clear that by no means am i saying this is literally how anything went down, or that i'm speculating on tencas's actual thoughts and feelings ! i basically just wonder a lot about the industry and wildt it must be; combine that with gay angst and u have a strawberrv fic babey !!
> 
> here is a teeny tiny [ playlist](https://open.spotify.com/user/kimjognog/playlist/2PwcZV3J5eH6ZvfKWgfBGb?si=o1zObMCxS5GHPor-jXwHiw) that goes w this fic!

they’re.

they’re not what lucas expects.

hendery, with his dark dark eyes and nearly too-wide smile,

and yangyang, so young but so utterly serious about this, about what they’re doing.

they’re like twins, almost, kind of.

lucas feels kun’s eyes on his back.

“it’s nice to meet you.”

stilted, stiff, the mandarin is like tree bark in lucas’s mouth.

he knows he doesn’t sound good, doesn’t sound natural.

yangyang smiles, bows, shakes his hand in an awkward kind of way.

hendery enthusiastically grips his hand, nearly too tightly, bows a few times — up and down and up and down, his black hair bouncing and shining in the lounge’s stark lights — and calls him _gē, lucas gē._

it’s strange.

not that they’re strange, not really; lucas has met so many others like them, attractive and manic running on so little food and even less sleep. and he’s met them in so many lounges just like this one, on different floors of different company buildings, maybe, but with the same quirky mismatched furniture and random decorative statuettes.

_they’re_ not strange.

_it’s_ strange.

and there’s dejun, of course, who lucas thinks seems so passionate it’s practically oozing from his pores, always talking about how he dreams of the stage and how he wants this more than anything — _more than anything,_ he says, thick angled brows pulling down, serious and passionate and kinda naive.

lucas thinks it must be bullshit.

lucas thinks this whole thing must be bullshit, anyway, but he’d never say that aloud.

he knows it’s not a coincidence, not by chance that it’s him and kun and sicheng, meeting hendery and yangyang and dejun.

not a coincidence that the staff tells them to _speak comfortably,_ meaning to speak in mandarin.

he feels it happening, this shift all around him like, like slowly but surely the ground he’s standing on is being pulled away. just a centimeter at a time, so he can’t prove it’s happening, and almost doesn’t notice.

but he _does_ notice, is the thing, and it’s driving him crazy.

he _notices,_ when he’s being encouraged to speak mandarin more often, to not worry too much about his korean lessons. he notices that suddenly he’s in the dance studios on the third floor, not the fourth. and he _notices_ when it’s just him and kun and sicheng, forced into a stupid lounge with dumb trendy decor, meeting three other dudes who look like they’re about to have their soul sucked out of them if they don’t perfectly move through each moment of their lives.

lucas remembers feeling like that.

it’s fucking dumb, and it’s fucking scary.

they make it so that he can’t put his finger on it, though. they do that stuff on purpose. they give them agreeable managers and kind enough staff, and of course, these unquestionably good new members who’ve lived almost the same life as him for the past few years, who want nothing but to get along.

and they also make him look at his friends and know that he holds their dreams (their literal fucking dreams) in his hands.

they make it so that when it becomes too much, when it gets suffocating and unbearable and frustrating, lucas raises his hand and can’t for the life of him find anyone — _anyone_ to blame.

it’s enough to drive you crazy, really.

 

there’s only one person lucas knows who really — really truly — lives off of this shit.

ten sucks it up like his lifeblood.

he loves it, and not just the good parts. not just the stage and the fans and the being in the best shape of his life.

almost despicably, almost like a fetish, like pain turned to pleasure, ten loves the bullshit of it, too.

he looks at the scum of it, at the horrific and untenably ugly parts and _adores_ them.

dating scandals and eating disorders and messily terminated contracts. members leaving groups and weird, unending tensions between idols. he scours the forums and eats up the speculation for all three meals.

even the little things, like the burn of colored contacts, and the crust that foundation makes around your nose when you sweat through it. the way mic straps cut into your hips and how in-ears gather up earwax until they’re gross.

not only does he look at them, he says them out loud, letting them twist on his tongue while he cherishes them, giving them words that are reserved for beautiful things. he’s a collector of sorts, keeping them like cherry pits in his mouth, sucking all the sweet out of the worst part of the fruit.

it’s freakish, honestly, but it’s why lucas likes ten so much. because he notices things, too, and he’d never, ever, let them slip by.

“you’re going to china soon?” he asks, airily, like everyone knows what’s been going on and has only been waiting for someone to say it.

which. well.

“i… think so. i think so. that’s what it feels like.”

they’re talking in korean with little bits of english thrown in, too, which is almost, like, cathartic. weirdly.

ten nods, bringing another chip to his mouth to bite off the corner of it.

“it does feel like that. maybe a year, year-and-a-half.”

lucas swallows. thinking about it in terms of time, like this time next year he’ll be somewhere else — that kind of makes him nauseous.

ten pops the whole chip behind his teeth, munching thoughtfully. he swallows, leaning forward, eyes sparkling like they do when he has gossip.

“i think there’ll be a new contract,” he says, and then leans back in his chair again, snatching up the bag of chips and grinning like he’s just told lucas the secret to the universe.

“what?” lucas says, like he’s just been told the secret to the universe.

“it’ll have to be the V one, i think, because of the country relations. and i’ll bet the money’s better, too. because, you know, once you get over there it’s pretty much sayonara to us —” he gestures around, to the dorm, to the _us_ that lucas isn’t a part of anymore.

“— and all the korean fans. looks like you’re livin’ it up with yixing now, xuxi.”

lucas’s stomach twists. ten giggles, evilly, in the way that he does when he knows something no one else knows. he brings his knees to his chest, socked feet half falling off the edge of the chair.

“i met them, the kiddos. the other day. one of them’s german; that’s fucking wild. and the hen-ry one bounces off the walls worse than jaemin. and, oh my god, that totally fuckable one with the eyebrows is totally faking it, right?”

lucas sighs, putting his head down on the table.

“yeah. he has to be.”

ten combs through lucas’s hair very gently, and kindly, while he goes on.

“right?! like, i get it, he’ll be the soft and thoughtful main vocal, and he’ll say the most sappy ments at concerts, and he’ll shed a single tear on the last stop of the tour, and it will sparkle — shut _up,_ xuxi, it will! — it’ll sparkle in the weirdly specific color of the lightsticks, and oh my god, it’ll be giffed a million different ways from a million different fancams.”

small huffs of laughter are being pulled involuntarily from lucas’s chest, and he’s shaking the table because his forehead is still on it, slowly sealing itself to the wood finish.

ten goes on, about how weird it’ll be when yangyang just busts out a _danke_ at the end of broadcasts, and how hendery will settle down once he gets off of the debut diet, and how kun will be so overbearing at first but it’ll only be because he wants to keep this thing so bad. and somewhere along the way it becomes way less cynical and way more comforting, which is so typical of ten, to sneakily weasel his way into being optimistic for someone. 

“and sicheng — don’t even get me started. he’ll be so annoying and overserious about becoming a _gē,_ but it’ll make him really happy, i think. he hates how we baby him so much.”

ten halts, but his hand keeps patiently working through lucas’s hair, long nails scratching a little on his scalp. lucas gets that back-of-the-neck feeling like ten’s looking at him, and when he raises his head he’s proven correct.

ten’s eyes are really fond, a rare look on him, and his lips are a little dry from talking so much. his cartilage piercing catches the light.

“what about me?” lucas asks, thinking that he can’t possibly imagine himself in this picture ten has painted, in this world a country away, with these people he doesn’t know. he can’t possibly fit, not with his lanky frame and too-big hands, and most of all not without — not without ten. how wrong would it be to stand next to anyone else in the painting?

but ten licks his lips, and mixes a new color on his palette.

with those sparkling eyes, he measures lucas’s form with a thumb and finger, and speaks him into existence.

“i think you’ll be sad, at first,” he says, honestly, because lucas is really asking.

“it’s like, almost worse, probably, the homesick thing. it’ll feel cruel that you’re so close to home, but still not allowed to go. probably torturous because you’ll be in shanghai, and it’ll be so much like hong kong so it’ll only make you miss it more. but you won’t show it too much. the variety shows will be fun, because you’ll know what’s going on way better than the ones here,”

lucas snorts.

“but yeah. you’ll be sad. the fans will only notice a little; there’ll one or two threads like, _is lucas from nct’s chinese unit ok?_ and you’ll make an instagram video to chill them out, and it’ll be fine. you’ll miss us, and you’ll miss _me_ the most, obviously,” ten gestures, being dramatic about it.

“but we’ll text. i’ll have to learn mandarin ‘cause you’ll forget all your korean so quick, i bet. taeyong will worry, feeling like he failed you and sicheng and kun, and the kids will miss you, especially renjun. it’ll be weird, for awhile.”

ten sighs, tilting lucas’s chin up with his index finger and kind of holding him there, like a magic trick. he has this look in his eye — the look of an artist, figuring out how to paint the sky behind the hills. lucas feels like he’s slipping, ghostly if it weren’t for ten’s hand, if it weren’t for ten.

“it’ll be weird and sad, yeah. but they’re good kids, the new ones. eventually you’ll remember that this is what you wanted to be doing. we all forget, sometimes. even me.”

he flips his hand so his knuckles run along lucas’s cheek, and his island-y lotion wafts around lucas’s face.

“you’ll remember, though. it’ll be a moment that fills you up like nothing else could. practicing or on stage, or something. it’ll be like remembering a dream from a long time ago,”

he presses his lips together, and he looks weird, like he’s been rolled up tight like a yoga mat. his other arm releases his knees so he can slip forward in his chair a little, wetting his lips.

then he says,

“it’ll float back up to the top of your soul… fast and easy.” and his voice kind of breaks and lucas realizes he’s trying not to cry.

ten blinks and blinks for a second, his hand is still on lucas’s face, just. holding him there, stretching out the seconds impossibly long while he swallows down tears. holding his breath, holding lucas, as if to say _wait, wait just a moment longer._

then he leans in and kisses lucas, softly.

it should be weird, but it isn’t. partly because they’ve kissed before and partly because it’s ten.

it’s ten.

then they let go, and ten is somehow recovered from his bout of emotion, and he finishes eating his chips, smiling coyly when taeil wanders in and asks what they’ve been up to.

lucas shrugs, because they didn’t even really do anything that crazy, but ten likes to play his mysterious games, so lucas lets him.

\

then, one month later, the unthinkable happens.

at least, unthinkable for them.

in hindsight, it wasn’t that out of the blue, and they probably should’ve seen it coming.

but in the moment, it feels like lucas has been hit over the head with a neon sign that says _surprise, idiot_ on it. twice.

the first is this: the chinese unit’s debut date is set.

the second is this: ten is in the chinese unit.

lucas has literally never seen ten thrown off his game. like, yeah he’s seen ten surprised, or scared, or a little embarrassed, but never completely, utterly, lightning-strike _shocked_ as he is now. 

he’s sitting in one of the swivel chairs that they only keep in the meeting rooms, which lucas thinks is dumb, but whatever, and he’s absolutely still. he’s got some kind of floppy hat on, and a face mask too, so lucas can just barely see his eyes, but that’s enough.

the staff sitting across from them are all looking at them expectantly, like parents watching their kids open christmas gifts. the rookies and kun are all giving responses appropriate to that scenario, grinning all dumb, trying to press their faces into more serious and responsible expressions — kun particularly — but failing.

yangyang and hendery are practically vibrating, holding onto each others’ arms with their legs bouncing and kicking, causing them to swivel a little bit in their swivel chairs. (lucas really thinks under no circumstances should hendery be allowed in a swivel chair because this is spelling disaster.) 

dejun looks on the precipice of crying and laughing, almost in pain.

sicheng is smiling, too, albeit in a much more reserved and secret kind of way than the others.

lucas couldn’t tell you what face he’s making if you paid him, but he knows he’s looking at ten, who is looking at nothing. possibly the vent at the top of the opposite wall, but it’s unlikely.

minutes pass and eventually the staff dismiss them, packets in hand listing concepts and logistics and practice schedules and projected goals — most of it in chinese.

ten holds his between his index and middle finger and he keeps dropping it while they walk out into the building. the rest of the group — god, they’re a _group_ now — scatter, presumably to celebrate and call their families, but lucas sticks by ten as he dazedly wanders down the main hall of the third floor. when they reach the elevator, ten looks at it like he forgot it was there, and blinks before pressing the down button.

“do you wanna go get coffee?” he asks, in a surprisingly normal voice, which only worries lucas more.

“uh. sure.”

technically they’re not allowed to go into town by themselves since it’s a weekday, but no one stops them on the way out so it can’t be too illegal.

they walk the two blocks it takes to get to the closest starbucks, and ten orders something really complicated while lucas just gets a bread thing with chocolate in it.

once they settle in at a table that’s slightly obscured, in the back of the store, a bit of color has returned to ten’s face, though he’s still not moving anywhere near as much as usual.

lucas jumps a little when he says,

“this is good right?”

he’s not looking at lucas, just staring down into his untouched, perfectly whipped-creamed beverage.

lucas says, “uh,”

and now ten does look up, and his eyebrows are pulled together, but he’s not angry.

“lucas. this is a good thing, right? i just. just say that to me ok?”

“this is a good thing.”

ten lets out a breath and nods, quick and sharp, to himself.

“right,” he says, and takes a sip of his drink.

and this is — this is weird. lucas doesn’t like it. this isn’t how ten deals with things. this isn’t how he operates in the world. he doesn’t ask people, especially lucas, to lie to him. he hates it when people lie to him, especially to conceal a more complicated or difficult truth.

he lives off the covered up stuff, really. he loves the ugliness of things no one wants to see because at least it’s _real,_ at least it’s bottom-of-the-heart, pit-of-the-stomach, back-of-the-tongue _true._

lucas shakes himself, clutching the bag with his chocolate bread in it and probably squishing the pastry a little. he says,

“actually, fuck this.”

ten looks up at him, eyebrows raised in surprise, green straw sticking to his chapped lower lip.

lucas runs a hand through his hair, emboldened.

“yeah, uh, this fucking sucks, dude.” 

like at confession, ten clasps his hands together, pushing his drink away and leaning forward to press his forehead to his thumbs.

he nods.

“yeah,” he says.

“you’re right.”

 

for the second time in his life, ten drops everything, holds his breath, and signs a contract in a language he doesn’t know.

except, this time, lucas holds his hand under the table.

they have a year. the springs are coiled tight, gears being put into place, while the rubber pulled so taught it threatens to snap at every moment holds them together, the seven of them.

kun walks the dorm, cooking and chatting as much as he possibly can before their practice schedule really ramps up. he constantly looks worried, almost terrified, like at any moment he’ll lose this. he holds onto their shoulder too tight when they take pictures, and he’s overstrict, like ten predicted.

dejun sings all day. all day every day, with guitar chords accompanying him sometimes, until a vocal coach tells him to stop or he’ll ruin his voice. he sheepishly sips at herbal tea for the next few days.

yangyang and hendery (which is just how lucas tends to think of them now, as a unit) never really stop celebrating. they dance all the time, basically ravenous for anything the choreographers give them.

most surprisingly, sicheng slowly but deliberately warms up, like a thaw of an ice age, it’s like watching him come back to life. he gets goofier, and he talks more, especially when his lingual braces finally come off, and he grows fond of the younger members quickly.

so basically, story of lucas’s life, ten was right.

ten was right and lucas is sad, yes, for awhile.

ten himself spends most of his time with tutors and videos and notebooks, learning character components and asking about tones and repeating words over and over to himself under his breath.

it’s the feeling of being kindling, of waiting for the fire. it’s not the kind of thing you get used to; it doesn’t fade into the background like white noise. it’s constant, humming under their skin.

warming them up and up and up.

the four of them have been through it before, know it a little better.

ten seems nervous regardless, though. afraid to mess it up, like all of them.

indeed, it’s strange. they don’t click right away and some days it’s depressing. some days lucas hangs around the studio, ghostly without ten’s hand to ground him, while ten himself is busy biting his fingernails off over messing up third tones.

but they remember.

like magic, ten's words become reality, and they remember that this is what they love to do. like a dream from long ago, it floats back up. lost and found in the same breath.

so in the final days, when the pictures are coming out and hendery won’t stop screaming on the phone with his sisters about the teasers, lucas takes ten’s hand.

and they wait for the fire.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading!!!! tell me what u thought owo
> 
> u can follow me on my main twitter @lookslikerain  
> or on my fic acc if you want to get some behind the scenes n writing process stuff!  
> @rouxberrv
> 
> <3


End file.
